The U.S. is only five percent of the world’s population, or less. The market in the U.S. is somewhat saturated in many respects. There are only so many cars you can sell in the U.S. So it’s become critical to every American company to be aware of the fact that the key to future growth is being able to be a successful multinational, a global company. We have found out how critical it is for all corporations to have an awareness and an understanding of what is it that consumers and customers around the world think, what they like, their cultural habits, how they behave.

One of the challenges that students have today, which is not a lot different than what I faced, is the problem of budgets being cut in education. I grew up in a very enlightened border town that was able to allow Mexican students to go to school...

One of the enablers that has really transformed our lives in the last 40 years was being the successful development of semiconductors or microchips as some other people call it. And it has gone from being an incredibly simple device that was used – I remember in the early days of microchips people advertised a two transistor radio, a three transistor radio. And because they were replacing what used to be called tubes. But then the industry moved very rapidly towards integration. So we created the integrated circuit soon after we created the microprocessor. And all of that just exploded in terms of the applications that they went into...

As a kid who worked shining shoes in the coal mining Mexican border town of Piedras Negras, Coahuila, Hector Ruiz could never have dreamed what his future would hold.

Inspired by a Methodist missionary to pursue an education, Ruiz went to a U.S. high school every day, became its valedictorian three years after learning English, earned a bachelor’s and a master’s degree from the University of Texas and went on to earn his doctorate at Rice University. He had a fruitful career in the technology industry working for Excel, Texas Instruments, Motorola, and eventually landed the top job as chief executive officer of AMD, a major player in the semiconductor industry.

On Friday, Ruiz was awarded the Ohtli award by the Mexican Consulate of Austin to honor his professional and business success and his efforts to help other Latinos, Mexicans and Mexican-Americans to follow in his footsteps...

Every July 4th, Carnegie Corporation of New York recognizes an inspiring group of well known naturalized citizens from all walks of life, with an acknowledgment in The New York Times. In 2014 Hector Ruiz was awarded.